Bringing on the funk with Maurice Brown
By John Murph, BETJazz.com Staff Writer

Posted Dec. 22, 2004 -- From King Oliver to Louis Armstrong, Fats Navarro to Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis to Freddie Hubbard, Roy Hargrove to Nicholas Payton, it seems that all great jazz trumpeters, regardless of generation or stylistic inclination, are drawn to the funk. Each of those aforementioned artists – and there are many more – have steered jazz significantly by incorporating those sweaty, syncopated rhythms, edgy riffs and blues-based melodies we call funk.

You can now add Maurice Brown to that illustrious list of jazz trumpeters. His debut disc, Hip to Bop sublimely integrates the intricate improvisational burn of bebop with the pulsating rhythms of hip hop and R&B.

In concert, Brown’s scintillating trumpet prowess has been turning heads and seducing accolades from such masters as Wynton Marsalis, Curtis Fuller and Clark Terry. BET Jazz talked with Brown about his debut CD and about his woodshed period in Chicago and New Orleans.

BET Jazz: Why are so many jazz trumpeters attracted to the funk?

Maurice Brown: I think that the trumpet is the closest instrument to the human voice. So, it’s easy for us to go for the vocal styles within the music and be real soulful with it. This goes all the way to Louis Armstrong. He used to be real funky when he played.

BET Jazz: Talk about your unique way of combining jazz with hip hop.

Brown: I just took the elements of hip hop and funk and kept those as my roots in my playing. I still stay true to the bebop form in terms of writing but everything has to be subdivided in the funk.

BET Jazz: Who’s currently in your band?

Brown: Pianist Anthony Wonsey, tenor saxophonist Derek Douget, drummer Gregory Hutchinson and bassist Charles Fambrough.

BETJazz: Briefly compare the jazz scene in Chicago with that of New Orleans.

Brown: The main difference is that Chicago is looser and more avant-garde. Free jazz is really big there. Straight-ahead jazz is bigger there than in New Orleans. New Orleans is more traditional but funky place.

BET Jazz: What was it like playing with saxophonist Fred Anderson, who’s mostly known as being an avant-garde player?

Brown: Fred was very key in my musical development. People like him and Von Freeman really took me underneath their wings when I was in Chicago. To play with Fred is always a spiritual thing, because most of the time we don’t use [scored] music. The last album we did at the Velvet Lounge, it was a live date and I wasn’t even supposed to be on it. They were recording the gig when I walked in and they asked me to play. I was going to leave but they asked me to stay to play on the gig; it turned out to be on the album. We played with no music, just total vibing.

BET Jazz: Take me back to the time Wynton Marsalis encouraged you to develop your musical skills?

Brown: When I first met Wynton, all this playing the trumpet was just a game to me. I wasn’t taking it seriously. I had a bunch of other things going on. I’m also a black-belt in Tae-Kwan Do. I played basketball all during junior high and high school. Meeting Wynton made me put everything else aside and say, “I really got something with this music.”
He told me, “Never stop playing. Keep practicing and practicing; you’ll be great. You might be even greater than me.” Things like that really got me motivated. If Wynton Marsalis can see this in me, I really believed that I had something. Music wasn’t a game anymore.

BET Jazz: Who are some of the more influential trumpet players for you and why?

Brown: Well, Kenny Dorham for the way he connected his lines. I’m a huge fan of Fats Navarro. I think a lot of today’s cats are coming out of him. He’s really the first cat to lay bebop down on trumpet. I also like Freddie Hubbard, who was the first person to say, “I don’t care.” He really played but didn’t care what people thought of his music. And he played from his heart. That’s real key in music for me, because you have to be honest; people have to hear the honesty when you play. You can’t try to be something that you’re not.

Of course, Dizzy Gillespie was a big inspiration for me. His skills as a leader set a good example for everybody. He gave everybody what they wanted; he was the people’s champion.
And you can’t leave Miles Davis out. He influenced me by how he always stayed true to the melody. Nowadays, a lot of cats don’t stay true to the melody. They’re so busy trying to play everything that you can’t hear the melody. You can play the melody with a lot of notes. That’s the trick. My song, “Conceptions,” has notes for days but you still can hear the melody.